Can someone give more details about it?------------------------------In the case of Formless Planes (arūpa) therearises only mind; in the case of Mindless (asañña) Planes, onlymatter; in the case of Sentient Realm (kāma) and Realms ofForm (rūpa), both mind and matter.-------------------------Page 329 ofhttp://www.buddhanet.net/pdf_file/buddh ... gsurw6.pdf---------------------------Please also read:Can mind exist without matter?viewtopic.php?f=13&t=17503

Inhabitants of the fifth of the nine abodes of beings (sattāvāsā). These beings are unconscious and experience nothing (A.iv.401). As soon as an idea occurs to them they fall from their state (D.i.28). Brahmin ascetics, having practised continual meditation and attained to the fourth jhāna, seeing the disadvantages attached to thinking, try to do away with it altogether. Dying in this condition, they are reborn among the Asaññasattā, having form only, but neither sensations, ideas, predispositions nor consciousness. They last only as long as their power of jhāna; then an idea occurs to them and they die straightaway (DA.i.118).

The Andhakas held that these devas were really only sometimes conscious, which belief the Theravādins rejected as being absurd (Kvu.262).

The Elder Sobhita was once born among the Asaññasattā and could remember that existence. These devas are long-lived. ThagA.i.291.

This probably rise more questions than give answers, for example if all deva and brahma worlds are pleasant abidings how you can expirience anything pleasent without perceptions or consiousness...

I would like to see a sutta reference (if one exists) which says that the asanna beings have body only, without any consciousness. I would have thought 'asanna' meant 'without perception' or 'non-percipient', but that's not the same thing as 'not having consciousness', as strictly speaking sanna and vinnana are not the same thing.

Asaññasattaa — realm of mindless beings who have only bodies without consciousness. Rebirth into this plane results from a meditative practice aimed at the suppression of consciousness. Those who take up this practice assume release from suffering can be achieved by attaining unconsciousness. However, when the life span in this realm ends, the beings pass away and are born in other planes where consciousness returns.

Asaññasattaa — realm of mindless beings who have only bodies without consciousness. Rebirth into this plane results from a meditative practice aimed at the suppression of consciousness. Those who take up this practice assume release from suffering can be achieved by attaining unconsciousness. However, when the life span in this realm ends, the beings pass away and are born in other planes where consciousness returns.

A few years , i felt that beings in the mindless planes ( rupa ) , ( like some of the high mountains , and some as the astral and celestial bodies ) , may have arisen in these planes , owing to their foundation of sila , and extensive samadhi , they may also have had a dislike to the ills of the changing nature of the mind , hence they come into existence of a plane devoid of the mind . On a parallel , beings that come into the existence in the formless planes ( arupa planes ) with only the nutritive contents of the mind to sustain the immense longevity , these beings may have had the dependence of sila and extensive samadhi , with a probable base of dislike to the various ills and afflictions that material form gets along with it .Thus the unending chains of causes and effects , for such planes to arise.

The Buddha mentions , that for full liberation the pre-requsite of both mind and matter is an essential dependence to gain fruition.

sanjay

The Path of Dhamma

The path of Dhamma is no picnic . It is a strenuous march steeply up the hill . If all the comrades desert you , Walk alone ! Walk alone ! with all the Thrill !!

What that means is that there are beings that are said to have no mind.They are mindless beings. The mindless beings are those whoget the fifth Jhāna in their lives as human beings or as Devas.They develop a special kind of fifth Jhāna. As a result of that,they are reborn as mindless beings. Although they aremindless, one day they have to die. So after their death,rebirth-consciousness must arise.

Personally, I think most of what's known as the '31 planes of existence' has been cobbled together from various sources throughout the canon. For example, the formless realms may have originally referred to advanced states of meditative absorption (since they correspond to the four 'immaterial' jhanas), but were later taken to also refer to actual realms of birth above the brahma-realms, especially for the benefit of non-returners (see Gombrich's What the Buddha Thought, 89-90).

But assuming such realms like that of the asannasatta are understood to actually exist and weren't simply used by the Buddha for his own didactic purposes in teaching brahmins, there's nothing in Buddhism that states all types of beings are or must be 'conscious' or 'percipient' all the time (e.g., people in comas are, for all intents and purposes, 'non-percipient' and 'unconscious' beings). And interestingly enough, these beings are said to fall from that 'realm' (which could perhaps also refer to a particular state of mind) "as soon as perception arises in them" (Walshe, DN 1).